Friday, November 18, 2011

Party: Scarlett's Woodland Picnic Birthday (Printables)

When I was thinking about Scarlett's birthday party this year I felt strongly about one thing: I wanted to have all the food prepped and ready about fifteen minutes before my guests arrived so I could wipe the sweat from my brow, take a deep breath, and just enjoy the party!

As much as I loved playing hostess it seems that often the event wraps up and I feel like I spent more time with food and clearing than with my guests. I think it's always the predicament of the hosts. It's an art to be sure to throw a great party with tasty food and interesting details and have some great, full-length conversations with your guests too. I can think of some fun ways (I've read, and seen, and tried) to do this and most of them involve not cooking everything yourself. I'm learning...

So Scarlett's party this year was designed to be casual: I invited our family to a Woodland Picnic. A pack-your-own picnic to be specific. And it worked perfectly! It was such a fun way to throw a party!

I was, in fact, able to have everything prepackaged and ready to go a few minutes before start time (which also gave me time to take pictures of Audrey and Scarlett in the wrap skirt and apron wrap dress I'd made for the occasion) and the guests had the fun of picking, choosing and packing from a spread of picnic foods.

The only thing that wasn't as perfect as the idea was the weather. That's how it goes in the Fall. It was warm enough to pack a picnic outdoors but not warm enough to sit and eat it there! So even though I'd gathered wood stumps for stools and made an over sized picnic blanket (imagine how fun that would have been!), this picnic was eaten indoors! Oh well. We all still had a great time.

Click to read all the details about the food, favors, printables and a surprise visitor!

This Woodland Picnic party had some hallmarks of a classic picnic including plenty of red and white gingham. This graphic print just doesn't get old for me! I loved combining it with some organic elements for this party including a faux bois tablecloth from Scarlett's first birthday, these great banana leaf individual picnic baskets (UPDATE: these baskets are no longer available, but these wicker baskets with handles would be cute) and a natural wood bowl for holding napkin and fork bundles. I used waffle dishtowels purchased from Target and bamboo forks inscribed with "Enjoy!" in red marker.

It was a lot of fun coming up with ways to package the menu. I bought a lot of supplies including kraft boxes, glassine bags, gingham fabric tape, and gingham cupcake wrappers from Jilly Bean Kids. Then it was a matter of figuring out what food went best with the supplies! I opted for lined kraft boxes topped with a round sticker for the Caprese Salad,...

...white round hot/cold containers purchased from this Etsy shop for the traditional three-bean salad (I actually purchased and spruced up with some fresh parsley),...

(I loved making the labels for these with a 3.5" round punch and the printables I designed! So many possibilities for this type of packaging...)

...candy, of course. Glassine favor bags filled with white gumballs for everyone and for more immediate snacking, an assortment of old fashioned candies in the right colors: mustard yellow and brown!

I also made something else for my nieces and nephews: faux bois mini clipboards with a stack of patterned paper and a twig crayon for doodling. I made the clipboards with my own faux bois paper (part of the printables for this party) referencing a how-to in this gorgeous book and added glass magnets with their initials on the clip. The magnets were a great find in the Michael's clearance section.

The clipboards were a big hit! I threw some stickers in the mix too and all the young guests were entertained.

Until the real entertainment arrived:

Cute Scarlett had been telling me for months that she wanted various fictional characters to come to her birthday. Winnie the Pooh and Smokey the Bear were frequent mentions. I wasn't keen on a lot of Winnie the Pooh images at her party and learned the rigors of the Smokey the Bear brand management (good for the Forest Service but I'm sad to learn Smokey doesn't make many appearances these days!), so having him visit wasn't possible. Luckily I found the perfect brown bear locally. Big and furry but still friendly, though Scarlett wasn't so sure at first! He brought Scarlett a woodland owl, red balloons for all the kids, and gave out big hugs.

It was a fun picnic birthday party!

(If you are interested in the printables I designed for this party they are available in my Etsy shop at 50% through November 30th 2011. Use the code PRINTABLES50.)

@Emily: No, no picture of the picnic blanket. It was a hemmed piece of fabric with an oversized version of the red and white gingham. We ended up putting it on the floor inside fore the kids to sit on but no photos...

I have been waiting to see this! It looks fantastic, such a great theme and birthday party.

I hope Scarlett was happy with the brown bear once she was used to him, what a shame about Smokey the Bear.

I think you said in a previous post that all you've done this year is plan parties, well you excelled at those, but you also planned a vacation abroad. You're going to need a mini-break once Christmas is all done. I imagine you're busy executing what you want to do for Thanksgiving and Christmas.

I landed here by accident, and I'm hooked! Your blog is beautiful, and inspiring - I think I'll be digging out my sewing machine this weekend, after a long hiatus. And your girls are stunning. Thank you for giving me an enjoyable hour or so, trawling through your posts. :)

You have done a superb job again! :) I love your images (and the look on Scarlett's face when the brown bear arrived!). I love you to share your tips on getting photographs of the birthday things... I never seem to managed it before the kids start demolishing it all! lol

Lori from Encourage Your Spouse sent me over and I'm so glad she did! I can hardly wait to put together a party like this. Wonderful ideas and your daughters are precious. Love, love, love all of the sewing projects, pom-pom flowers, food, everything! Thanks so much for sharing!

I followed the link over to the baskets but I think it's just outdated because it reads product not found. Are you familiar with another site that offers reasonably priced baskets? I'm having a lot of trouble finding any.

@Haley: This party was a few years ago so yes, it doesn't appear that they carry these baskets anymore. I did find other basket on their site that are a lighter color and similarly priced (about $5) https://www.luckyclovertrading.com/natural-round-tray-basket-medium-10in-p-2147.html

What a cute party! I will definitely incorporate some elements for my daughter's 1st birthday Woodland Animal theme party. Thank you for the lovely pics, descriptions, recipes, and links to where you got everything!